Rosalía (Post-Flamenco Art-Pop From Spain)

I just stumbled across this woman's work this week, and am blown away. Her first album, Los Ángeles, was kind of avant-flamenco, but very stripped-down and raw, with lots of songs about death; it was almost Chelsea Wolfe-ish at times. Her upcoming album, El Mal Querer, is a little more poppy/conventional, but it still uses the handclapping flamenco rhythm rather than standard beats, and the visuals (which are also all hers) are fantastic.

First video - "Malamente":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rht7rBHuXW8

Second video - "Pienso en Tu Mirá":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_4coiRG_BI

it's been a while since i was this amazed by every aspect of an artist's work on first impression like this, both those songs and videos are so good and the flamenco rhythms rule so much

visuals good but the first thing sounds *exactly* like what i'd imagine if someone said 'minimal flamenco pop' to me, it's a snooze

second song has more going on, especially rhythmically, but it still sounds like all the breathy moody pop ever

You might like her first album better:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NfDEEyg3AdA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6s-MQzPZ6IE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OMwDZUWl5g

I like both.

"Pienso en Tu Mirá" is astounding – a bit more info here:

- https://www.eamonn.com/2018/07/28/rosalia-pienso-en-tu-mira/

- https://www.npr.org/sections/altlatino/2018/07/25/631879546/rosal-as-lethal-mir-and-anitta-s-medicina-our-favorite-latin-songs-this-week

Mentioned here, Rosalía will be acting in Pedro Almodóvar's new film. She's also appeared on this track by J Balvin, "Brillo" - https://youtu.be/tkfM5Aq_NDU

album is out November 2nd

“El Mal Querer” sale el 2 de noviembre 😱😱😱😱
Droppin my new album on nov 2nd ♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️ pic.twitter.com/cUkMSw8V44

— R O S A L Í A (@rosaliavt) September 13, 2018

Capitulo 1 AUGURIO - Malamente
Capitulo 2 BODA - Que no salga la luna
Capitulo 3 CELOS - Pienso en tu mirá
Capitulo 4 DISPUTA - De aquí no sales
Capitulo 5 LAMENTO - Reniego
Capitulo 6 CLAUSURA - Preso
Capitulo 7 LITURGIA - Bagdad
Capitulo 8 EXTASIS - Di mi nombre
Capitulo 9 CONCEPCIÓN - Nana
Capitulo 10 CORDURA - Maldición
Capitulo 11 PODER - A ningún hombre

Philip Sherburne has a nice profile & interview w/her today: https://pitchfork.com/features/rising/get-to-know-rosalia-the-spanish-singer-giving-flamencos-age-old-sound-a-bracingly-modern-twist/

I'm definitely curious about the album--the newer tracks are so different from the prev album. Like unperson I'm into both approaches but not 100% sure I want to hear handclaps on every track.

new video out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUBMPaj0L3o

lovely bass on that one

I don't love the new video as much as the two before it, but I'm still really excited for the album. And the video is kinda Halloween-worthy, in a way - those creepy backup dancers appear out of nowhere.

yeah I just watched Malamente again and this video is nowhere near that level. I like the autotune on the chorus (?), feels like a quick leap over the Mediterranean

I love all the songs and videos and am really excited for the album to come out tomorrow.

I know she's the subject of significant controversy in Spain given her use of flamenco and Andalusian tropes generally as a woman from Catalonia. Are there any Spanish ILXors that can shed any further light on this? I've seen stuff on social media and other forums about it but there's not any English-language writing about it yet as far as I'm aware.

Listening to the new album now. It's pretty amazing.

US Spotify link

really great on first listen. less poppy than I was expecting in some ways. every time I wasn't sure about a track it would swerve in some other, unexpected direction.

I feel like people into stuff like Kelela or FKA Twigs would be into this, though to my taste the amount of space given to the vocals on this is more appealing

Interesting work of fusion. I like it as it is, Bagdad for example. Agree that Pienso en tu mirá is astounding.
I'm sure to check her next.

album is a bit underwhelming, not as poppy as the singles yeah so what I loved about those doesn't come through as strongly on the rest of the album. the Cry Me A River interpolation on Bagdad is kinda jarring too

Pienso en tu Mira is so gorgeous.

The album is a lot more meditative than the singles suggested - I still find it very beautiful though, and I'm not too concerned about its failure to, outside the singles, lean into pop tropes, as she's apparently made a bunch of songs (some of which she's already playing live) with producers like Pharrell and a guy that did some stuff on the Cardi B album. I suspect her label will want to capitalise quickly on all this - the streaming numbers are enormous in Spain - and release a second album or EP sometime next year.

She also went all-out Rhythm Nation on this EMA performance which to me seems like more evidence that she's a burgeoning superstar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZTaZRLv3GE

Pitchfork gave a glowing review of the album today as well.

Just shows how flexible these songs are. Compare to this performance:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_fWWs8xqb0

The Guardian also gave the album 5 stars last week. https://www.theguardian.com/music/2018/nov/01/rosalia-el-mal-querer-review-flamenco-pop-star-is-a-formidable-new-talent

Hearing the crowd sing along at that MTV performance was really something.

The Cry Me A River sample I think works in that it's so incongruous especially in a song that develops into faux-liturgical counterpoint. I wish I understood the words so I had more of a sense of what she was getting at there.

I know nothing about flamenco but this record is great. If she becomes huge I'm more interested in what mainstream pop can co-opt from her rather than the other way round. The way those handclaps just pop amid all the digital production is consistently fantastic.

I don't truly speak Spanish but I can give it a go.

Y se va a quemar, si sigue ahí / And it will burn, if it continues like this
Las llamas van al cielo a morir / The flames rise to die in the sky
Ya no hay nadie más por ahí / There is nobody left around here
No hay nadie más, senta'íta dando palmas / There is nobody anymore, sit (?) and clap your hands

Por la noche, la sali'a del Bagdad / In the night, the exit (?) of Bagdad
Pelo negro, ojos oscuros / Black hair, dark eyes
Bonita pero apena' / Beautiful but only...
Senta'ita, cabizbaja dando palmas / Sit (?), head bent clapping hands
Mientras a su alrededor / While around her
Pasaban, la miraban / They pass, look at her
La miraban sin ver na' / They look at her without seeing anything
Solita en el infierno / She's alone in hell
En el infierno está atrapa' / In hell she's stuck
Senta'íta, las manos las juntaba / Sitting (?), she put her hands together
Que al compás por bulerías / To the rhythm of Bulerías
Parecía que rezaba / She seemed to pray

Junta las palmas y las separa / She joins her hands and separates them

De las luces / From the lights
Sale un ángel que cayó / Comes out an angel who fell
Tiene una marca en el alma / He's got a mark in his soul
Pero ella no se la vio / But she hasn't seen it
Senta'ita, al cielo quie' rezarle / Sit (?), in the sky who prays to him/her (?)
Prenda'ita de sus males / Ignited by her vices
Que Dios tendrá que cobrarle / So that God will have to cover her

not sure about all of it obviously

woes, rather than vices

Actually, she's probably the one burning (first line). Maybe it's an execution.

There's a hefty interpolation of Jolene in one song as well.

It took a couple listens to fix my malamente expectations, but this album is astonishingly good! I can't even isolate favored songs at this point. I can see why monotony called it "meditative" (as opposed to "banging" I think?), but it can also be quite dramatic in what I assume is a traditional flamenco vein, as on Reniego.

To Matt's point, I would love to see the consistently striking way the production handles acoustic space and vocal/sound arrangement catch on elsewhere. I thought JES's pitchfork review was v good--the "global bass" framing struck me as odd at first but thinking of this as a rooted-in-the-local antidote to generic pan-global trop-house is interesting.

A lot of pan-global trop-house/Spotify pop has a tendency to fill up every single available bit of space, this uses a not dissimilar sound palette in a much more imaginative way.

❤️”Di Mi Nombre”❤️

I know she's the subject of significant controversy in Spain given her use of flamenco and Andalusian tropes generally as a woman from Catalonia.

These seem to cover it pretty well, re: Gypsy culture and Andalusian culture:

- https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=es&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.elespanol.com%2Fcultura%2Fmusica%2F20180531%2Fgitanos-atacan-rosalia-usa-simbolos-pestanas-postizas%2F311468865_0.html&edit-text=&act=url

- https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=es&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=https%3A%2F%2Fmagnet.xataka.com%2Fpreguntas-no-tan-frecuentes%2Frosali-apropiacion-que-se-acusa-malamente-robar-cultura-gitana-andaluza&edit-text=&act=url

The original articles were on El Español and Magnet.com. I can't speak much Spanish, but the translation reads OK, apart from google often printing 'she' as 'he'.

A couple of quotes:

"The Gypsy activist Noelia Cortés believes that Rosalia 'uses the Gypsies as something cool to incorporate into her disguise, but she does not care socially' [no le importamos socialmente hablando]." – (El Español)

"Rosalía's own roots offer another complex variable to analyze appropriation: the Castilian-speaking culture of the Baix Llobregat [in the province of Barcelona], composed mostly of second and third generations of immigrants from Andalusia, Murcia or Extremadura, has certain affinities with that of their ancestors, whether on a musical level or in some dialectal aspects. The same happens with tracksuits or car tuning: they are characteristic elements of the poligonera culture, so associated with the Barcelona red belt.

"What the controversy reveals, in any case, is the penetration of the identity debate and theories about racial identities and historical discriminations in Spain. And also the complexity and subtlety of many readings about the cultural products that will come in the future." – (Magnet.com)

During the controversy earlier this year, she posted a playlist of flamenco songs that comprise the lyrics and melodies on the Los Ángeles album.

Aqui va esta playlist como regalo de reyes, donde podréis encontrar de donde aprendí los cantes que aparecen en Los Ángeles, con las letras y melodías que componen el disco. Que la disfrutéis!!🎁✨☺https://t.co/OPAVqBTewG

— R O S A L Í A (@rosaliavt) January 4, 2018

"Malamente" won a UK Video Music Award for best pop video.

this is not my fav album of a payo ex/appropriating flamenco this year. the relationship between gitano culture and spanish culture is more interesting to me than this music, which leans hard on these signifiers. the magnet article has the sort of weaselly equivocation I've seen before on this topic

also:

The theoretical appropriation of Rosalia works and works well at the narrative level when the intent is directed towards the gypsy culture: the ethnic group has been socially and legally persecuted for five centuries, and although today there is no formal discrimination, the gypsies still live apart in many ways. cities and in permanent social exclusion. It is probably the only Spanish historical case to which the American racial narrative fits.

hmmm

the relationship between gitano culture and spanish culture is more interesting to me than this music, which leans hard on these signifiers

What did you think of Mala Rodriguez's last single/video? (She actually is gitana.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKJE4-9qRIk

this is a good album

I like her singing and prefer the intensity & energy of that track to the cooler detachment of rosalia. as per matt dc, the way the claps work with the glossier sound are what's most striking to me about rosalia, & I wld imagine other ppl will lift that trick

i love this album but man i'm so excited for her to drop her new shit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAVZ5tXL6lU

as if to further illustrate this ^ - new video for "bagdad" features a bit of "lo presiento" at the beginning

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2WOIGyGzUQ

This review (from The Nation, of all places) was very interesting to me because I usually don't pay attention to lyrics, but the author makes it clear how crucial they are to this album:

https://www.thenation.com/article/rosalia-flamencos-new-album-el-mal-querer-review/

Missed this thread; discovered her (2) albums via end-of-year lists. Absolutely love them... her voice!

Way into both of these albums as well.

https://www.stereogum.com/2027027/rosalia-oneohtrix-point-never/news/

Entertaining and slightly nerdy analysis.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgHXFTgaVT0

I'm updating the thread for no other reason than I still enjoy checking her different performances so much. Maybe I'm crazy but I still feel like she has this spectrum of moods that each of her songs works with and that make me scream art.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLWfMPPh1F8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRph0jV4mO4
Someone tell how I left out this song from my top25, oh yes, it's partly because of the others.

Also she said she'd love to collab with Dua Lipa and that'd be ultimate sexiness, so fingers crossed.

“Di Mi Nombre” is still my favorite of hers.

This is cool, first time I've seen a vid of her performing. I'm so into El Mal Querer

she's going to be on the james blake album out tomorrow

And since you mentioned it. We hear her first, as we should. I'm not familiar with James Blake, but he makes me think of Anthony. Nice duo.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LkoaO8-z6I

Delicious actually. And incredible delicate performance. Her parts (my amateur translation):

Agujerito del cielo - Little hole in the sky
Cuelando el brillo de Dios - letting in the brilliance of God
Un rayo cayó en tus ojo' - a beam struck your eye
Y me partió el corazón - and split my heart
Agujerito del cielo - Little hole in the sky
Díctame por dónde ir - instruct me where to go
Para yo no equivocarme - so that I do not get it wrong
Y así ver mi porvenir - and thus see my future

Ya tengo to' lo que quiero - I already have al' that I desire
Ya no puedo pedir má' - I cannot ask for mo'
Cuando te tengo a mi la'o - When I have you by my sid'
Lo pasa'o se queda atrá' - The pas' is left behin'
Si te apartan de mi vera - If they separate me from your side
Y te tuviera que encontrar - And if I had to find you
Hasta allá te encontraría - I would find you up there
Como el río va a la mar - As the river goes to the sea

not sure quite how to articulate this properly yet but it seems to have a similarly collage-y nature to Happier Than Ever. I guess I'm just still not convinced by her as a reggaeton artist

it's a weird album that's not a big pop move like one might have expected she'd eventually come out with after her 2019 run of singles, but it's not as good as happier than ever either in terms of slightly-left-of-centre pop albums

nothing as compelling as the best stuff from el mal querer or even those 2019 singles unfortunately

I've listened to about half of it (several tracks are grayed out on Tidal, for some reason) and it's pretty good. The singles, which I hated as standalones, work better in context.

One thing that's made me laugh pretty hard this morning: I guess a memo went around among pop critics that the new way to signify one's savviness and superiority to the reader is to quote her lyrics without translating them.

this works surprisingly well as a complete work
definitely lacks the intensity and extraordinariness of El Mal Querer
but on the other hand i was surprised that it's as quiet and melancholy as it is (resembles Los Angeles in that way) - not the dull pop cash-in that La Fama seemed to portent

i really love the off-kilter production quirks like the (so quiet!!!) piano on "Saoko" or the drums on "Hentai" - signals an art/experimental affiliation that i appreciate

It's definitely odder than I expected, which is a good thing, though I'm also finding it elusive in its disjointedness, lack of intensity is otm

The lack of translation in the pfork review annoyed me; fwiw the NPR review is an exception: https://www.npr.org/2022/03/18/1087060987/rosalias-motomami-is-a-complex-treatise-on-fame-and-her-place-in-latin-pop

she "presented" the album "live" on tiktok last night, with snippets and themed visuals for each song. for those interested: link

I'm still learning how to listen to her if I (still) have trouble finishing her albums.

I do laugh at "BIZCOCHITO," a bit of slang I've heard all my life locally.

Half-way impression: what I imagine Kanye West to sound like when people complain that he does half-finished products. This is mildly annoying, no cohesive sound, ideas scattered, bad choices, and I only wish it was pure reggaeton. Pretty big fall.

La Combi Versace is possibly what I wanted from this album

Whats the interpolation on “candy”? It’s killing me that it’s on the tip of my tongue but the different language is throwing me off.

Oh yes it’s Burial duh

This is actually not as bad as I thought it would be based on “chicken teriyaki”.

I’m actually surprised I’m liking a great deal of it on first listen.

Xpost: don’t agree that it’s a pretty big fall, but otm that more songs like “combi versace” would have been very welcomed.

“Candy” though

I know a big part of why I’m loving that one is the Burial connection but it’s a brilliant reinterpretation imho

great album

it's definitely not 'el mal querer' but that album also feels like such a lightning strike that i'm not sure she could make another album that sounds like it that would actually be better. best just to move on & expand the sound. just generally in terms of artists who are making fringe mainstream experimental pop i think her music is so much more rewarding and fresh than idk fka twigs, charli xcx, arca etc i'm sure there's some other artists i'm forgetting

Now that I've listened to it all the way through it's...nice. The most traditional tracks ("Delirio de Grandeza" and "Sakura") are the only ones that will really stick with me, I think. "Sakura" reminds me of a modern fado album by Lina Rodrigues and Raül Refree that came out in 2020; I interviewed them about it at the time.

do listeners still care about FKA Twigs? No sarcasm -- I don't know.

I'm halfway through this, and I agree it's a more enjoyable listen than the pre-release singles suggested it would be.

Some of these tracks sound pretty cool, actually.

This is gelling more on second listen. Bulerías is another strong connection to her past work (pity it's followed by Chicken Teriyaki), and yeah in general there's a lot of interesting production stuff going on that will take a while to sink in I think

Personally I’d save these ones:

LA FAMA ft. The Weeknd
SAOKO
CANDY
LA COMBI VERSACE
DELIRIO DE GRANDEZA
CUUUUuuuuuute
SAKURA
BULERIAS
BIZCOCHITO

And probably trash the rest.

the album has been out for like 12 hours

It could be 12 years and I still wouldn’t have a positive opinion on chicken teriyaki or think motomami or diablo aren’t disposable

Rosalia interview feature in New York Times:

. A column that ran this year in “El País” included concerns that she had “pulled a ‘Miley Cyrus,’” going from lyrical Lorca allusions to simplistic, dirty rhymes and oversharing on social media.
The truth is, Rosalía wants it all: to be erudite and avant-garde, sexy, silly and absurdist. In intense yet giggle-heavy Spanglish conversation, she drops references to Jung’s “el inconsciente colectivo” — the collective unconscious — and her obsession with TikTok; in lyrics, she pledges allegiance to Niña Pastori, José Mercé and Willie Colón but also Tego Calderón, Lil’ Kim and M.I.A.

s. “I listened to Don Omar, Ivy Queen, Lorna, Yankee, Zion & Lennox since I was at least 13,” she said. “This is part of my experience.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/17/arts/music/rosalia-motomami.html

modern fado album by Lina Rodrigues and Raül Refree that came out in 2020

haven't listened to the new rosalía album yet, but popping in for an enthusiastic co-sign of the lina_raul refree album

i liked that times piece a lot, i thought it honed in on her as a restless artist who is guided by experimentalism & i thought that was a framing of her that i haven't encountered often, and it clicks w/ the way this album came out

agree w/ the posts in here about how this is way better than expected, don't even mind "Chicken Teriyaki" at this point

Yeah, the Times piece is good. I'm pretty weary of ahistorical Twitter-brain "you can't do that" critiques of music (and movies, and books) and I'm glad to see that she's not letting herself get bogged down in dumb arguments, and is just doing what she wants to do, combining things that excite her in interesting ways. I don't like all of it, obviously, but more power to her.

It could be 12 years and I still wouldn’t have a positive opinion on chicken teriyaki or think motomami or diablo aren’t disposable

Agreed... I think Moka's list of tracks to "save" is a pretty good one

this album is just great

yeah, aoty for me so far but idk if it's bc it's just that great or bc my expectations were so low

I wanna go to her show here but I think even the cheapest tickets are $100+

what the fuck

Yeah even in Mexico her ticket prices are through the roof.

F*cking Money Man

based on ticket prices i’ve seen this year actually seems pretty reasonable. at least you know she’s gonna put on a show

Well she’s at least doing something very unique on the genre and pushing it in a fresh direction. Her international success is great if it pushes more artists to be more experimental on a genre that risks so little.

That said as someone who has a club in the biggest fair in the world (feria nacional de san marcos) this album is way too experimental and melancholic lol, we haven’t been able to play her new album to a good response yet.

You can check steve aoki’s instagram and the building that says FVL! that’s us.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Cca-jDdO-dn/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

wow, moka - that's awesome!!

They're advertising her DC show via a credit card company ads on tv here in the Washington DC area, and tickets are about $100

Thanks sean!

After 12+ years doing this I’m feeling like I’m getting too old for it lol. I’m seriously considering early retirement from the club scene, probably just stick to less hectic sort of scenes. It’s a great business but super stressful in this scale.

this album is way too experimental and melancholic lol, we haven’t been able to play her new album to a good response yet.

i feel like "bizcochito" could be mixed into something, right?

i've decided my favorite moment on the album is "sakura," which is probably the most el mal querer-like, but there's a lot to love here and something new to latch onto with each listen.

Long English-language interview. The interview's ok but not on her level; she's really fucking smart.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFOp-G04jw8

Took me a few listens to hear, absorb, and appreciate everything going on on this album -- it's ridiculously cool. Opener "Saoko" really sets the tone; here, let's put a jazz piano interlude in a 2:17 pop song that interpolates a Wisin & Daddy Yankee track.